STORIES, STORIES

Write In Jeddah , a support group for people writing books in Jeddah, started in August 2017. It was inspired by NaNoWriMo write-ins that my friends and I have attended in the past 6 years or so, when we'd get together for a few hours everyday to work on the books we were writing. If you're based in Jeddah and you'd like to be part of a group to motivate you and inspire you into making your book a reality, join us! (Find out how at the end of this post.) Our main goal is to get published, and to achieve that, we meet regularly to discuss our challenges, learn about publishing and meet people from the industry, and share our progress and wins with each other. I can go on and on about the benefits of being part of this group, but I won't, because I can't articulate it better than the members do. Here are some of them with their comments about our first 4 weeks of write-ins. Hakeem Jomah says: Benefits I get from our sessions... - 9 times out of 10,...

One of the best things about being a writer in this day and age is the endless stream of resources on the craft available to us. It’s also probably one of the worst things, because in truth, there’s so much vague writing advice floating around that’s really not that helpful. I have, however, read a few books this year that have really helped me understand and practice some writing techniques. They’re rich with practical tips, are straightforward and easy to follow, and they leave room for you to try them out for yourself.  The Glamour of Grammar This isn’t your school textbook on English grammar, and I wouldn’t say it’s for beginners – it goes deeper than your basic verb tenses, but helps you review them anyway. What I enjoyed most were the chapters on archaic grammar rules and the evolution of the language and what constitutes acceptable. The book is also very, very Not Boring. I recommend it for all writers and editors.  It me, your father. Best thing ...

Jeff Goins’ post on New Year resolutions for writers inspired me to write my own (my favorite one is “Don’t take yourself so seriously.”). This year, I’m focusing on really (really for-real this time) honing my writing skills instead of just dicking around with it like I’ve always done. As with all resolutions, my writing goals can’t be too grand or I’ll end up just adding them to the list of things I failed to do. My achievable writer goals for 2017: Write about writing.  I’m big on tricking myself into accomplishing things, because it gets things done. My goal here is two-fold: get myself to write regularly, and also actively learn something about the craft. I’ll be posting a lot on this topic, both on my blog and on social media, as part of my learning and practice. Actually use my notebooks.  I’ve amassed a pretty big collection of notebooks, many of them blank because they are just “too pretty” to write on. Aside from that, though, I’ve gone almost completely ...

I pretty much Gregor Clegane the editorial department at work. Hard. One of my responsibilities is making sure that copy is clean, which is not easy to do when I have tons of other non-editing-related tasks throughout the day. Style guides are the obvious answer to 99 of my work problems as they do the explaining for me, and they settle editorial arguments on our floor. A production meeting at work. Not in picture: Gregor Clegane. If you’re looking to invest in creating your own style guide, be it for your work (I work in publishing, but many non-publishing companies have style guides, too), or your blog, or just for fun if you’re a massive productivity nerd, here are some tips that might help you out. What is a style guide? A guide to your brand and all its parts. The style guide can work as a good base, to understand why you do what you do, and to remind you of your core values when you try something new and get confused about whether or not you’re doing the r...

Stories That (Probably) Need Telling by Nessreen I’m not gonna lie. I was reading Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s The Thing Around Your Neck , a collection of short stories about the experiences and thoughts of Nigerian women from different backgrounds, when I decided to finally, actually in-real-life-and-not-just-imagining-it , write the book I had been putting off for years now. There’s nothing more inspiring than reading a brilliant storyteller, but now I know that inspiration is one thing, and actually putting in the work is another (why do I know this only now ?). Obvi it wasn’t going to be easy, and I knew that off the bat. I have mediocre writing skills (I generally speak better than I write, I promise you), horrible writing habits, a glaring lack of writing accomplishments, and an inflated sense of grandeur, which all meant that tackling this mountain that is writing a book is exactly the kind of thing I would go for. And so here we are. In 2013, I left Saudi Arab...

Writing Triggers by Alia Makki Tell me again. Why do we keep doing this to ourselves?  You mean writing?   Haven’t you already gotten it figured out by now that at the end of the tunnel, it doesn’t get any brighter or easier? Life doesn’t get easier. Writing distracts you from looking at yourself personally. Why should you write?  Because it’s the most beautiful thing in the world. And this scene! Look at it! How could we not be inspired…   Hasn’t it failed you already? Why couldn’t you take a hint from the millionth failure?  Because the million-first might be the one!   Bosh. Sorry, who?   Pshawh. Shucks. Bollocks. Bull. I’m calling your disgusting sense of optimism a delusion.  Oooh. That’s a nice word too. What just happened? Was it a mosquito that landed on your face? Then why did you hit your face for? Listen. My job was to try to distract you from this futile habit of yours. I’ve done my job and could only manage ...

The Craft by Nessreen "There's only one way to become a writer," they all said. "Write." Alright, I said. Close all tabs, open writing topic generator.  "More Than Friends," the website blinked once. "1,000 words." Right. I wrote.  More Than Friends It was a funeral. She was uncomfortable. She knew no one, probably no one knew her. But that's alright. People are generally accommodating at funerals, even to – especially  to – strangers that show up. These strangers who come to pay respects. After all, what's the worst that could happen when someone has just died? Nothing can upstage death, not even another one, you could suppose. So everyone is assumed to have been friends with the deceased. For the sake of the funeral. But they weren't friends. They met years ago at her first job. She worked for a rich woman – tidying up her space, scrubbing her bathroom walls, lining up her perfume bottles...

It's taken two full years of me living here to finally warm up to Kuala Lumpur enough to set foot outside of my comfort zone... and into my comfort zone. I know, it's complicated. I can't tell you enough how complex it is to have spent most of your formative adult years in a place like Saudi, and then uproot yourself to continue life in a less confusing environment (in this case, Malaysia). For two years, I stayed within the confines of my new home and workplace, which were both thankfully in the same 3-mile radius, presumably to acclimate and become "normal". For the most part, this meant learning to stand on my own two feet – living alone, doing my own chores, finding ways to feed myself, living on a budget, really just the basics. I couldn't afford to spend time on hobbies and my interests, I soon discovered, as all my energy was directed towards "not being in Jeddah". Who knew that took so much effort? I continue to see everything through ...

"As newspapers and magazines become more obsessed with shorter, breezier stories and visual gimmickry, readers adopt that sensibility as normalcy. We are losing the ability to understand anything that's even vaguely complex."  – Chuck Klosterman, Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs As someone knee-deep in the publishing industry (I'm a publishing executive in the editorial department of a media group here in Malaysia, which, in short form, means that I have my nose buried in all aspects of publication), I nodded so vigorously at this essay by Klosterman. Here's a typical instruction given to our business- and lifestyle-magazine writers all day everyday: "Write smart, write the kind of articles that you want to read. Our audience is sophisticated, intelligent, and very discerning. State everything clearly so that you don't lose your readers. They don't want to have to read complicated sentences, or encounter uncommon words." What this means to...